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Vanity

The new VICE special "Fighting ISIS," which first airs at 10 PM EST this Sunday on HBO, is an hour-long deep dive into the current state of Iraq. The current state of Iraq is not good. Since the US invasion toppled Saddam Hussein and George W. Bush declared "Mission Accomplished," a series of mistakes made by both the US and local authorities turned the country into an incubator of extremism and violence and led to the rise of ISIS. In the documentary, VICE reporter Ben Anderson embeds with various groups fighting ISIS, interviews captured jihadist fighters, and investigates the troubles...

DES MOINES — Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and actress Ellen Page, of “Juno” fame, got into a testy and free-wheeling discussion Friday over gay rights here at the Iowa State Fair. “I’m happy to answer your question but not to have a back-and-forth debate,” Cruz told Page, as she pressed him about discrimination against LGBT citizens, approaching him as he flipped pork chops over an open grill. But the two then proceeded to have a spirited exchange over gay rights and whether private businesses — florist companies, for example —can refuse to cater gay weddings in the name of their...

It's the morning of Friday, January 20, 2017, and it's Inauguration Day. Donald John Trump Sr. has his hand on a Bible, and America looks on, agape, as he swears to "preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States." How we got to this point isn't important. The question now is, what the [expletive] is about to happen? To come up with even the vaguest answer, we have to look back at history. Because as British TV science guy James Burke once said, "Why should we look to the past in order to prepare for the future? Because...

EILAT, Israel – The V15 group working to defeat Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government in the upcoming election has confirmed to WND it is primarily financed by an American billionaire and a Mexican entrepreneur who is a U.S. resident. V15, short for Victory 2015, attracted U.S. media attention after it hired 270 Strategies, a consulting firm whose senior leadership is comprised mostly of former top staffers for President Obama’s 2012 re-election campaign. Uri Wollman, V15′s spokesman, told WND his organization’s ballooning infrastructure is funded primarily by three private philanthropists: •S. Daniel Abraham, the billionaire founder of the Slim Fast...

Last week, Breitbart News revealed a secret video game journalist mailing list used by a clique of influential writers, editors, and bloggers, some of whom attempted to bully their colleagues with it in an attempt to shape the news agenda for political purposes. We can today reveal the complete list of journalists, some 150 key industry figures, on the list. Outlets with representation span the entire video games journalism universe and include Polygon, Ars Technica, Wired, Eurogamer, Destructoid, Kotaku, Joystiq, TechRadar, and many other well-known brands in games publishing. But they also include freelancers and staffers for publications as solidly...

Vice.com has a piece up titled How Sad Young Douchebags Took Over Modern Britain (H/T Captain Capitalism). In the piece the author struggles to identify why the culture of young men has changed in recent years: But while it’s easy to scorn the banality—and the vanity—of the modern British douchebag, they’re only products of their environment. An environment that has very little to offer them anymore, other than gym memberships, intentionally ripped clothes, alcohol, and creatine. The institutions that gave British men a sense of well-being have been ripped apart. Nobody trusts the police any more; nobody wants to join...

Something interesting happened in Canada this week, and for once it had nothing to do with Justin Bieber or Captain Kirk. Their Supreme Court effectively struck down the nation’s laws involving prostitution, though the definitions of the specific laws in question aren’t as straight forward as the title might suggest. The Supreme Court of Canada has struck down the country’s major prostitution laws, saying that bans on street soliciting, brothels and people living off the avails of prostitution create severe dangers for vulnerable women and therefore violate Canadians’ basic values. Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin, writing for a unanimous court, stressed...

Gavin McInnes, co-founder of Vice and often described as “The Godfather of Hipsterdom,” kicked a hornets nest this week by suggesting that modern feminism has been detrimental to women. “We’ve trivialized childbirth and being domestic so much that women are forced to pretend to be men. They’re feigning this toughness. They’re miserable,” McInnes said in part during a contentious and expletive-laced exchange on a HuffPost Live panel on Monday. McInnes received forceful push back from the panel, media and social media for his comments. The founder of Street Carnage, however, explained in an interview with The Daily Caller that he...

A federal judge ruled this week that exotic dancers at a Midtown strip club are protected by labor laws and entitled to be paid at least a minimum wage. The ruling came Tuesday in a class-action lawsuit brought by current and former dancers at Rick’s Cabaret, at 50 W. 33rd St. The lawsuit against Peregrine Enterprises – the subsidiary that operates the club – and the club’s Houston-based parent company, charged that the strippers were denied wages and required to pay a variety of fees to the club. The club had argued that the dancers were independent contractors....

From corporate boardrooms to the headquarters of the city’s Democratic political campaigns, phone lines lighted up and strategy sessions were organized on Monday with a single mission in mind: stopping Eliot Spitzer. The surprise decision by former Governor Spitzer to run for citywide office startled and galvanized the city’s political establishment, which worried aloud about handing the TV-savvy and self-financed candidate a new megaphone. In candid conversations, some of the leaders expressed acute regret over their failure to swiftly undercut the mayoral campaign of former Representative Anthony D. Weiner, another scandal-scarred candidate for citywide office, and said they would not...

Tampa, Florida (CNN) -- Go-Go and Ezili are dancing cheek to cheek on a Friday night. That is to say they're spinning, glute to glute, on a polished chrome pole at a strip club. A thunderstorm leaves puddles in the parking lot under a sign that boasts "OMG! These girls are hot!" The strippers try to "make it rain" inside, too: When patrons approve of their gyrations by slipping credit cards into machines that look like ATMs, the sound of recorded thunder rolls across the stage. Sure enough, $1 bills flutter from the ceiling onto the twirling twosome. The joint...

If this analysis is anything like Hugh's constitutional knowledge, follow this analysis closely. That means Hugh is on to something. On the other hand, if this analysis is anything like Hugh's sports picks, stop reading this post immediately. Hugh realizes that some of the polls out there are basically meaningless, as they are using only registered voters with a big overwhelming sample of Democrats. That just doesn't meet the reality of the political landscape today. So, those polls following that model cannot be anywhere close to accurate. Hugh knows that Governor Romney has his own internal polls that clearly give...

With the rumor that Condoleezza Rice is a frontrunner to be Mitt Romney’s vice-presidential pick, she’s the talk of the town. She’s so intelligent, so sophisticated, so statesmanlike and so scholarly that she could make you wonder if Hillary Clinton really ever was “the most intelligent woman in America.” That’s the pitch, anyway. But when you check this Rice’s ingredients, you have to ask, where’s the beef? When assessing this, I’m reminded of how the late Christopher Hitchens put Bill Clinton’s so-called intellectual prowess in perspective. The 42nd president has a long history of making statements, Hitchens pointed out, yet...

One time I read an internet posting made by a woman who had stopped renting to some Christians who had been tenants at her property. Her reason? They made her feel bad about herself. People who have no intention of dispensing with vice don't like moral standards they pale in comparison to -- which is why moral relativism is all the rage today, and why there is rage at Christianity -- and they don't like moral standard-bearers they pale in comparison to, either. Why do you think the Bible states, "What fellowship hath light with darkness? The darkness hates the...

Saudi religious police HQ targeted by sex maniacs Tried to create a sex video right in front of the police headquarter signboard By  Staff Published Sunday, November 27, 2011 Three Saudi men parked their car close to the headquarters of the Gulf Kingdom’s feared religious police late night, got out and started having sex with a woman accompanying them just in front of the massive police signboard. They were filming themselves with the aim publicising the shot to defame the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, the most influential law enforcement authority in the Muslim nation....

Tuesday morning on AM Tampa Bay on 970 WFLA, Vice President Joe Biden was asked by Jack Harris about the Occupy Wall Street Movement. The VP said "I really don't know about the Van Jones group, except what I read in the press." The group is currently protesting in New York City against the social and economic inequality, corporate greed and the influence of corporate money and lobbyists on government. Later in his response in talking about the frustration seen in the Tea Party and the Occupy Wall Street Group, Biden said "you have on the one end Van Jones'...

Yesterday we had the Bundesbank making a very strong case for why a pan-European bailout (funded by Germany), would need a "fundamental change of regime occurs involving an extensive surrender of national fiscal sovereignty" (beneficial for Germany), today we see the next and final stage of the proposed annexation of Europe by Germany - that which focuses on procuring that which is really important. Hint: not spam. From Spiegel: "Minister Ursula von der Leyen pushes the hard line: any financial aid for euro countries should only come against collateral - as gold reserves or industrial holdings." More google-translated conditionality: "The...

County prosecutors from across the metro said Friday they are overhauling their policies to ensure that juvenile prostitutes are treated as crime victims instead of criminals, even as some regions of the state see an uptick in teen prostitution cases. "We need to do the right thing as it relates to children who are victims of prostitution," said Ramsey County Attorney John Choi, who was joined at a news conference by prosecutors, police chiefs and victim advocates from across the Twin Cities. "I believe we should be doing everything we can to get them out of the system, and never...

KUALA LUMPUR (AFP) – As couples around the world ready for Valentine's Day, Islamic officials in Malaysia have warned Muslims against celebrating something "synonymous with vice activities." The warning follows plans announced last week by several Malaysian states who are planning a crackdown on "immoral acts" during Valentine's Day as part of a campaign to encourage a sin-free lifestyle. "In reality, as well as historically, the celebration of Valentine's Day is synonymous with vice activities," Wan Mohamad Sheikh Abdul Aziz, head of the Malaysian Islamic Development Department (JAKIM), which oversees the country's Islamic policies, told state media. "Islam would reject...